T
he latest controversy hounding the beloved king of offensive machismo, Willie Revillame, has to do with this meltdown he had in “Wowowee!” The following words were uttered when ABS inserted a window on the TV screen showing the procession of the body of former President Aquino from La Salle Greenhills to the Manila Cathedral while his merriments were going on. This is what he said according to the article “Willie Revillame violated code of ethics – MTRCB” Hindi siguro magandang tingnan na pinapakita niyo yan (Mrs. Aquino’s footage). Nagsasaya kami tapos pinapakita niyo yung, I don't think dapat ipakita yan.
Eh mahihirapan akong magsalita rito. Nagpapasaya ako nakikita ko ‘yung ano (cortege) ni Tita Cory. Sana pakitanggal naman muna ‘yan sa ating traffic. Kasi kung ganyan pakita nalang natin ‘yan kasi nagsasaya kami dito tapos masakit sa akin yan. Nagsasalita ako dito yan Pls, sana maintindhan niyo, nagsasaya kami dito papakita niyo sa amin yun. Diba? Hindi tama eh okay?
Hay nako. Pangit. Hindi maganda ho sa atin nagsasalita pinapakita yung kabaong ni Tita Cory. Diba? Paano kami magkakapagsaya nahihirapan kami? I'm sorry ho ah pero ako totoo ako eh. ‘Wag niyo akong papagalitan...Pagkatapos ng show pakita niyo ‘yung gusto niyong ipalabas. Kasi itong Wowowee gusto ko at alam din ni Tita Cory ‘yan kasi napasaya din siya ng show na ito na laging masaya dito. Okay? 1
What poor Willie is trying to say in his halting, perhaps annoyed, clearly caught off-guard manner is that placing the live footage of the procession for the transfer of Tita Cory's body in the same screen as his wildly undulating show is done in bad taste. Firstly, because it does not respect the grandeur of the event. There, in a small screen, dwarfed by crying gay boys being outed in TV and an audience maddened by the onslaught of distractions, was the solemn send-off procession for the best loved president of this threatened Republic. It’s just so ABS to do something like that: maximum circus with minimum consideration for potentially offended sensibilities. Secondly, Willie was unable to proceed with his usual irreverence and sacrificial-audience-member badgering while such a mournful event was taking place. Thirdly, and most importantly, the contrast in events was just too extreme that their mutual presencing would have canceled each other out.
Willie’s extravaganza is an avalanche of sights and sounds meant to dissipate the self. There is the constant dancing, the getting-to-know-you of contestants that borders on a grotesque charade of the Dr. Phil-esque exposure of psyces, the karanabal-like display of talents of contestants which prelude the games, and the prize-givings which are the creamy centers of this elaborate, over sugared pastry of an event. Willie’s show is exactly a doughnut dipped in sugar, topped with a sprinkled bed of layered frosting, and stuffed with the thickest, sweetest cream. It’s a pastry that one has to consume completely because once in your hands it keeps drawing you in until it is consumed. When you have completely consumed it, you are filled with this dizzy feeling of having taken in something that fills you but not in a good way. It leaves you uneasy and queasy, but it felt so good in the mouth that it keeps you coming back for more. It's something like the mall.
The mall is a wonderful place that is designed to allow you to disperse yourself. It is meant to draw your attention to all kinds of sensory delights designed to titillate you appetites and push your desires to their limits. In a mall, your mind and will are dispersed such that everything is supposed to draw you hither and yon, and you are meant to be so dispersed that you act and want on sheet impulse. Because you keep moving and wanting, it seems that your life, for that brief moment is full, but at the end of it, you're tired and dispersed and empty. That's why you can't wait for the next time. It's like computer games, casual sex, ecstasy, and so many of the things that we do.
Tita Cory’s funeral rites were something completely different. And, when something does come along that manages to attract our attention and gather us, something like the solemnity of a sincere, albeit slightly showbizzed, a-Dieu to a beloved person, we are silenced to self-gathering. That is I think what happened to us in the days around August 5. When Tita Cory died, the nation seemed to fall silent as if everyone lost someone who meant something to them. We all did. We lost someone who stood for our best possibilities given our finite, broken selves. Tita Cory could be seen as a model person. A model person, according to Max Scheler, is a person who bears, in her finite way, the best possibilities of being a person given a particular value system. She was our model person for she showed us how to be humble, simple, and steadfast; to be courageous and and open to the call to service; to be selfless and love one's people; and to be a good mother to one's children while being responsible for the children you have embraced as your own, i.e. all of us.
The funeral rites for Tita Cory captivated us. People everywhere were glued to their television sets watching the huge crowds of Filipinos line up to pay their respects and listening to those who knew her talk about her simplicity, great care for people, steadfastness, and great love. Listening and watching, being attentive to the expressions of love and admiration, participating in rituals of remembrance and sending-off to God—these things quieted us. The rituals of saying goodbye to one who showed us who we are and how simplicity, constancy, and courage could win the day reminded us what we as a people could be. As we remembered her in saying goodbye, we remembered our best selves, and we were gathered interiorly.
What happened in those days was the polar opposite of what happens every day at Wowowee!
There, people are given the best offering of forgetfulness through layers upon layers of noise and haste. As we are immersed in Willie’s world, we are allowed to forget ourselves, or make a spectacle of ourselves, or see ourselves as bathed in the borrowed light of the showbiz world. There we don’t find our best selves, our selves that can triumph over crushing poverty, our selves that can love our children in the most degraded conditions, or our selves that can create lives with dignity and hope in the most decrepit environments. There we find our carricature selves: the stereotype gay boy televising the drama of his angst, the genuinely sorrowful widow of a dead soldier singing out of key through her tears, and the old lady with insurmountable debts dancing to Willie’s delight. These are our sorry selves that are translated to television marionets for everyone’s delight. The projections are not meant for us to know and embrace who we are but to forget how truly, potentially tragic human existence is. And for that treat, and perhaps more money that we can ever imagine, we are willing to let Papi have his way with us.
Now that Willie himself is hinting at political ambitions, he is telling everyone that he has been serving the public now for so many years. He has been serving us not as a theif but as a giver of gifts. He said in the news “Hindi ako magnanakaw, mambibigay ako.” Or something like that. But I’m not sure how true that is. For how much entertainment and money he has given, how much of our selves has he taken away?
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[1] GMANews.TV. Sunday, August 9, ( http://ph.news.yahoo.com/gma/20090808/tel-willie-revillame-violated-code-of-et-284c369.html), accessed 20 August 2009.
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